Archive for July, 2007

Sun, sun, sun….and my purple dress makes me feel like some sort of hippy princess. If only every day were a purple dress day.

I’ve just told my boss that I am working with too many clients and absolutely cannot take on another one. Keep in mind this is the person who will be interviewing me for a promotion. I think I was quite helpful as far as absolute refusals go. I’m now liasing with another agency, so perhaps that will make me seem less mulish?

I totally don’t care.

I’ve spent a lot of time in life being the good girl, bending over backwards to accomodate employers and prove how ‘worthy’ I am/was. No longer. I know I’m very good at my job, and I also know my limits. I’m already unable to follow up with about half of my clients because they keep shoving new ones in my direction. That’s not benefitting the young people, the company, or myself. And in that sandwich, I think the two pieces of bread are more important than the meat.

Did you get that little quip? I am disappointed if not, even though I know my food metaphors leave people in a pickle.

Ha. I tickle myself.

Anyway, got some interesting responses from my Buddhist group. Including a semi-helpful one from an author who lives in my city. An actual living, breathing, hugely successful author.

I don’t know. Going to take some time later to reread their reponses more slowly, and then get in touch with individuals to thank them and possibly ask them more questions! This will probably definitely (oxymoron of a sort?) include emailing the author lady. Us lesbian Buddhist writers need to stick together…don’t we?

Small steps forward.

The interview for Friday has been cancelled and postponed to some unknown date. I’ve bought four (interview) shirts to take home, try on with my trousers and model for TMD, and then need to return the loser shirts (aww) tomorrow. I need to go grab some lunch now, before I head out for other client meetings.

I am feeling more and more determined to set up a private practice and only be dependent upon myself, business-wise. I like working for agencies, particularly in counselling when it’s just you and the client most of the time, but I would LOVE to be able to leave my current job and work privately. Spoken like someone who truly deserves a promotion.

I’ve not done anything crazy or over-enthusiastic like renting a cheerleading outfit, but I have turned yesterday’s hopelessness into a sort of take-small-steps-forward-ness.

Got in touch to arrange the interview, did some online hunting for a consulting space to rent, batted my eyelashes at my good looking business cards, etc. I’m also plugging away at the mounds of data entry stuff for Day Job.

The other thing I did was send an email to a Buddhist email group I’ve been lurking in for ages. Told them I have not chanted in a good few months, and also briefly shared some of my problems regarding writing. Hopefully this is a step in the right direction, and I’ll get some helpful words of guidance.

I just think it’s interesting that I’ve spent the last week abroad for another job, living so happily and really enjoying myself. It casts a strange pall to be suddenly in this airless, windowless, morgue of a basement again. Clicking and clacking away on this computer. A girl can only write up so many casenotes before her brain melts and begins to ooze out of her ears. Thank god for being able to erase histories of visited sites. Facebook and now this diary. Onward ho!

Here for another hour and a bit, then off to see some counselling clients. I hope my pal CheerfulBitchyGayMan is working reception tonight. I love that guy.

Well, I’ve now completely woken up…after an entire day of sleeping, waking up for 5 minutes at a time, and repeatedly asking TMD if it was possible that something had gone terribly wrong and I would never be able to fully wake up again.

Feeling really down about going back to work. I enjoyed this past week so much. Never did I have horrible morning diarhea, or dread the next day – even with all the maps and probabilities that I would get terrily lost or eaten by a bear. As it was, I ate fruit with my fingers, saw a bear and some deer, drove on the most winding road ever, saw some great camps, went swimming, and spent a lot of time with myself. I loved it.

I just don’t understand what seems to have occured. Before leaving, I was all excited about starting private practice, and seeing it as a reality. I also had applied for a promotion at work and was 95% sure I’d go for the interview if it was offered.

Then on the plane ride back, I was thinking about how I could keep my job and probably work full time – even though that would mean giving up on everything else I had planned. Aussie told me about an email sent out by work regarding the promotion – interviews this Friday, apparently. And suddenly I don’t want to bother with the interview, for so many reasons. I don’t really want to bother with work, either.

My hope is that my counselling clients will come tomorrow, and I’ll remember why I like therapy so much. And perhaps I’ll be more geeked up again. I’ve got new business cards which are gorgeous, a nifty silver card holder, and some oversized postcards.

This promotion. I don’t know that they would hire a supervisor who only wanted to work three days. As far as I know, they’ve only hired one part-time supervisor – a four-dayer – and within a month of the promotion she was working five days. I don’t really want this. I think I’m scared about not getting it, but also wondering if it will mean more or less work. At this point, I don’t want to do more work for them than I have to. I would love to quit my job and get The Fear, perhaps allowing me to make money from being creative. But TMD points out that she is starting an MA this autumn, along with other very expensive, long-term investments that will be happening in the next couple of years.

Yikes.

I am tired of being a grown-up, and I’ve only been awake for about seven hours.

Well, I’ve been back in the country for about 36 hours now. I’ve been sleeping about 94% of the time, reading (and crying!) over the last Harry Potter for 3% of the time, and eating or peeing for the remainder.

Just ran across the street with TMD in our ‘not suitable for public’ clothing. Aussie and BirdWatcher live across the street from us, and they luckily had a CD case for me to borrow.

I have loaded the case up with gems such as Eminem, Dar Williams, the Wicked soundtrack, John Mayer – and on and on and on. I am fairly certain a more random assortment of twenty CDs could not exist. And that’s not even accounting for the several mix CDs from Blondie, or the one I’m making right now. Yum. Delicious. Etc. I even found the soundtrack of Reality Bites. Fairly certain I ganked that off a friend at some stage. Whoops.

ANYWAY – the whole point of writing this was to say that I flashed Aussie with my fantastic new green-with-white-polka-dots bikini top, and she then made me flash BirdWatcher because ‘he’s never seen boobs like those.’ Bless him. He did not break painful eye contact with me once. All this bikini stuff is pretty big news, because I’ve actually lost 49 pounds in the last year. I’ve only worn a bikini once, when I was 13.

I’ve bought two and have packed them both for this little business trip, and I’ve booked a hotel with an outdoor pool. I suspect my stomach is going to get burnt something propa.

Anyway, must finish packing my carry-on. I am mildly worried about trying to navigate myself around the-city-where-Rent-was-based for the next couple of days, which is ironic considering I live in a city with fucked up pretend buses that take unmarked routes. I manage them okay – if you call ‘okay’ getting on it going to wrong way just this past Monday and resulting in a lovely circuitous trip around the north of the city.

I always tell people that I am anti-social, but I’ve been reflecting about how I actually do have a very tight circle of friends. My sister Blondie has always been the sort of person to have thousands of friends one year, and then a whole new set of thousands the next year. I’ve always been the sort of person to have a small handful of really, really good friends that last. When I was a child, I felt like a loser. My younger sister was the pretty one, and she had so many friends it only seemed to highlight that I spent all the time locked in the bathroom reading.

As I said to Integrity today, I am very selective. My time is precious, and I only want to spend it with people I truly care about and will enjoy seeing. I do not see people for the sake of seeing them. Nothing sounds more tedious to me than going out every evening; I get exhausted just listening to friends talk about their social lives.

Luckily, I keep getting invited to things even though I only say yes about every fifth time.

Integrity is a woman I met at a counselling stint, and she’s fab. Culturally, I think I feel a connection to people when I first meet them and they have a non-obnoxious accent from my home country. As it turns out, she’s from a totally different continent, though her accent is spot-on for home. She’s been a therapist for ages and ages, and she’s only a couple of years older than me. It’s quite strange, but really nice to have a non-college friend to talk about therapy with – and one who is my own age? Unique. Very.

I’ve been thinking that while this little counselling thing was an utter washout, at least I got to meet her. It’s rare I meet people I am very interested in continuing a personal relationship with, and also scary to tell someone you like them! I don’t know why, as surely people like to be liked, but I suppose there’s always the risk of them getting a carefully blank expression and a ‘Yes, we really must meet up again.’

When I get back from camp(s) in August we’re going to meet up. It feels like this could be a real friendship, like it has the potential to really develop. Could she be one of my finger-countable friends? Maybe.

I leave tomorrow morning for Inspecting Camps And Pretending That I Am Serving An Actual Purpose, and am sure I will not be writing from tomorrow until I return on the weekend of the 28 July. It would be nice to return to a diary surprise. Maybe you guys could have some sort of wild party here, but clean up afterwards…and leave a DVD of your antics for me to pop in when I get back.

Or maybe I’m just being an alabaster moon-person.*

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I’d like to substitute ‘moon-person’ for an offensive term, but only if you have seen The Mighty Boosh would you understand my love affair with the moon. The real moon. The best moon.

I had a lovely evening today, and as I walked home I was thinking about how I could write about it. I’m having a hard time classifying someone into a neat little nickname, and even now as I think, What do these nicknames really matter? I know how I feel about these people, I still feel an urge to somehow encapsulate her just right.

She’s strong, creative, talented. Any nickname I an think of relating to her job just seems non-namey. We shall call her Filmetta, though.

Anyway, Filmetta and I were supposed to drive down to have dinner with CurlyGirl this evening, but Filmetta was unwell. By the time the afternoon rolled around, she had managed to see her clients (she’s also another student counsellor. We are everywhere.) and ring me. We met up for a quick chat …well, one and a half hours…in our pocket of town. It was just this nice little break away from everyday reality.

Nice, quiet, continental-feeling restaurant. A small, intimate table. And just an interesting chat with a friend I really respect and enjoy the company of. It’s always nice when people you really like really like you back. I’m disappointed CurlyGirl wasn’t there, but in reality it was nice to have one-on-one time with Filmetta.

There is a mild level of relief that we didn’t talk about writing. The last time I met up with her, she was encouraging me to write screenplays and offered to hook me up with some filmmakers. Saying it could be interesting to just write short films, which is an area she has done a lot of work in. I found myself feeling really motivated – and really pressured. Still, I was high on initiave the day after this first meal, going into town to a film shop and buying some screenplays to read. I was all hyped up on the idea of getting her copies of Oscar and Bafta nominated screenplays so I could see what a real script looked like. Hell, I even came home and wrote about a page and a half.

I don’t know what my issue with writing is, or why I suppose I must feel pretty crap about my ability. I used to think I was great, and now I don’t know. Perhaps in an oblique way, I’ve spent the last (almost) two years with Kleinette stepping into my own pile of Existere-shit, and figuring out how to welcome it into my life. I feel like it’s the unknown, and therefore terrifying.

I feel the same way about starting a business and becoming self-employed. Filmetta neatly killed my anxiety this evening by matter-of-factly explaining exactly what I needed to do, essentially slapping me about a bit and saying, ‘There is nothing to be anxious about.’ It was helpful, and know I feel that the unknown is a little more known. And therefore achieveable.

I long for some sort of creative mentor who can serve the same sort of function.

I think I need a ‘grown up’ to hold my hand and sort of usher me around. Yet I loathe the idea of trying to actively get myself a mentor. When a well known author joined a Buddhist email group I belong to – and identified herself as living in my city – I felt a lot of emotions…none of them very positive. I just sort of have this phantasy/fantasy of opening myself to the idea of allowing myself to be helped, and then The Helper just neatly stepping into the frame. Because somehow they’ve received the notification that it’s time to enter, stage left.

I am always helping others, and perhaps it’s hard to admit that I might really, really need someone to help me. I am sure Filmetta would be the first to say I could do this on my own. I just want to stamp my feet and say, ‘But I don’t want to do it on my own. I’m scared. I’m really scared.’

I know she’d also be the first one to step in and offer practical and emotional support if I veered towards screenwriting, but screenwriting doesn’t seem where I want to be. It’s an arena that has been offered to me in the past, and I don’t know. Did I not leap at it because it wasn’t right, or because my fear was too strong?

I am happiest writing about my own experiences, thoughts, processes. I like trying to welcome all the bits of myself that might float away back into my life. The whiny, the glorious, the angry. Everything that I am, all the colours that are part of me, ever ebbing and flowing and changing. I don’t know how to box that up neatly onto paper, and sometimes I wish Someone would just give me an assignment to write something, because then I could do it. I don’t know what it is about me, but I feel like I can’t take any real level of responsibility for myself in this arena.

I do see myself quite easily writing about therapy in the future. That doesn’t give me a problem. I somehow don’t classify that as ‘writing.’ And ‘writing’ is what I have a problem with.

It’ll be hard to be away for eight days and not have access to a computer. I clarify and process myself through these blogs, and wonder what it will be like to not come home and pin myself up like a butterfly each evening. Instead I’ve just got to fly around and be beautiful.